In some instances, the active and passive combine in the production of HYBRID dreams. The scene for a television program, movie or theatrical play is played out (often in a very creative manner). A different version might be offered, or the dream moves the narrative further into the future. The happily married couple in that movie are portrayed in the dream as older adults who are having marital problems or are dealing with the pending death of one member of the couple. The televised battle between two mythic armies is turned on its head and the “bad guys” actually win.
Insight-Generating Perspective
Dreams can yield insights in at least three domains: (1) interpersonal relationships, (2) culture and (3) personal psyche. I turn first to the way in which dreams might provide us with insights regarding our relationships with other people. I turn to the wisdom offered by psychoanalyst, Erich Fromm (1951) in the exploration of this function.
Interpersonal Insights: While Fromm addresses many other ways in which dreams yields insights, he is particularly focused in his case studies on interpersonal insights. He sets the stage for his analysis by noting the fundamental difference between the world of our waking life and that of our sleeping/dreaming life (Fromm, 1951, p. 27):
While we sleep we are not concerned with bending the outside world to our purposes. We are helpless, and sleep, therefore, has rightly been called the “broth of death.” Bu we are also free, freer than when awake. We are free from the burden of work, from the task of attack or defense, from watching and mastering reality.
As Fromm suggests, we tend to “bend” reality when we are awake. In this state of bending, we are “reasonable” and “decent.” By contrast (Fromm, 1951, p. 33) we are less reasonable and not very decent in our dreams; however, “we are also more intelligent, wiser, and capable of better judgment when we are asleep than when we are awake.” As reasonable but less intelligent human beings we are facing a world that challenges us in many ways—especially the world of interpersonal relationships.
We desperately want to trust other people, successfully work with them and find them to be competent and caring. This might not actually be the case—but we have to “believe” (especially if they are very close to us—even intimate). It is during our dreams that Fromm suggest we are set free. Our defenses can be lowered or even set aside. We can see other people “as they really are” – or as one aspect of them “truly is.” In concluding a set of case studies about dreaming, Fromm (1951 p. 45) concludes that:
Not only do insights into our relation to others or theirs to us, value judgements and predictions occur in our dreams, but also intellectual operations superior to those in the waking state. This is not surprising, since penetrating thinking requires an amount of concentration which we are often deprived of in the waking state, while the state of sleep is conducive to it.
